Protestant 'army' pledges end to N. Ireland violence

Catholic leaders welcome surprise announcement but express skepticism

Associated Press

Published 5:30 am, Friday, May 4, 2007

DUBLIN, IRELAND — The Ulster Volunteer Force, an underground Protestant army that terrorized Roman Catholics for decades, and committed the bloodiest attack of the Northern Ireland conflict, renounced violence Thursday and promised to evolve into a force for good.

Leaders of the British territory's Catholic minority welcomed the surprise announcement. But they expressed skepticism, given the UVF's hate-fueled past and criminal present as well as its breaches of its own 1994 cease-fire declaration.

The British, Irish and U.S. governments all called on UVF commanders to demonstrate their sincerity by surrendering weapons stockpiles, an act completed two years ago by the rival Irish Republican Army.

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"This is a real end for the Ulster Volunteer Force," said Gusty Spence, the founding father of the UVF, at a Belfast news conference. "The steps outlined today in this statement, I truly believe, will bring us closer to the peaceful, democratic, prosperous future that all our people deserve."

UVF members killed more than 400 Catholic civilians from 1966 to 1994, the year the group called an open-ended truce. It exploded four car bombs in the neighboring Republic of Ireland that killed 33 people on May 17, 1974 — the deadliest terror strike in four decades of sectarian bloodshed over Northern Ireland.

The UVF statement came just five days before a new Catholic-Protestant administration for Northern Ireland is scheduled to take office in Belfast, fulfilling the dream of power-sharing in the Good Friday peace accord of 1998.